Israel and Palestine Politics Discussion

October 7 was the worst calamity in Israel’s history. It is a national and personal turning point for anyone living in the country or associated with it. Having failed to stop the Hamas attack, the IDF has responded with overwhelming force, killing thousands of Palestinians and razing entire Gazan neighborhoods. But even as pilots drop bombs and commandos flush out Hamas’s tunnels, the Israeli government has not reckoned with the enmity that produced the attack—or what policies might prevent another. Its silence comes at the behest of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has refused to lay out a postwar vision or order. Netanyahu has promised to “destroy Hamas,” but beyond military force, he has no strategy for eliminating the group and no clear plan for what would replace it as the de facto government of postwar Gaza.

An IDF soldier forces a bus full of Palestinians to say sentences such as “We want to be slaves of the Azolai family forever and ever.” and "To work for them in sewage and gardening".

How the Court’s Considered Measures Can Help America Restrain Israel

With one eye on the law and the other on its power, the International Court of Justice at The Hague has issued a preliminary ruling in favor of South Africa’s claim that Israel’s military assault on Gaza may plausibly be characterized as genocide. In a nearly unanimous vote, the court’s international panel of 17 judges ordered that Israel must do everything it can to prevent acts of genocide, clamp down on domestic incitement to genocide, and ensure immediate and effective humanitarian aid for Palestinians in Gaza.

Some may read the ICJ’s order as a limited legal intervention that refuses South Africa’s principal request for a ruling that would end Israel’s devastating campaign. The judges even offered an olive branch to the Israeli government, pointedly emphasizing that all parties to the conflict in Gaza “are bound by international humanitarian law” and calling for the “immediate and unconditional release” of the more than 100 Israeli hostages that remain in the custody of Hamas and other groups in Gaza.

But the court’s ruling also contains a hidden ambition: it challenges all states—and especially the United States—to take international law seriously at a time of increasing violence and conflict and decreasing respect for the authority of international legal institutions. Indeed, at a time when the Biden administration’s efforts to limit the war’s harm to civilians seem to be flailing, the court threw it a lifeline, a path to a new policy toward the conflict that is rooted in international norms. The White House should embrace the court’s ruling, deploying it as a new diplomatic tool to end Israel’s military operation and force Hamas to release the hostages it still cruelly and unconscionably holds in Gaza.

15 coalition MKs also take part, with many dancing at right-wing confab attended by thousands; Likud minister appears to endorse coercive measures to promote Palestinian emigration

As of the time of writing of this article, since October 7, more than 360 Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank, while thousands have been wounded and thousands more arrested.

Norman Finkelstein is a political scientist, prolific author, and son of Holocaust survivors. He received his PhD from the Princeton University Politics Department in 1987. He is the author of many books that have been translated into 60 foreign editions, including THE HOLOCAUST INDUSTRY: Reflections on the exploitation of Jewish suffering, and GAZA: An inquest into its martyrdom, I'LL BURN THAT BRIDGE WHEN I GET TO IT! Heretical Thoughts on Identity Politics, Cancel Culture, and Academic Freedom. In the year 2020, Norman Finkelstein was named the fifth most influential political scientist in the world.

Craig Mokhiber is a longtime international human rights lawyer who served as director of the New York Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights. He has resigned after publicly accusing the U.N. of failing to address what he calls a "text-book case of genocide" unfolding in Gaza. His resignation letter has gone viral.

We in Gaza are literally dying every day, every minute, every second. Our lives have been turned upside down since October 7, and now only revolve around our most basic needs. Where can we find water? Is there any aid coming in? Where do we go to collect it? Do we get flour today from Salah al-Din Street or Al-Rashid Street? Have the tanks withdrawn from this area or are they still there? Can I go to my house to inspect it? Is it safe to gather my children’s clothes from their rooms?

The fear that dominates me now is the fear of becoming normalized to this reality. That fear extends to the continued and shameful silence of foreign governments to our suffering. But it’s not only them: the absence of the Palestinian government — or perhaps two different governments — and the Palestinian parties is deafening.

I do not know anymore, or perhaps I cannot know, who is to blame for our suffering. Certainly, the main cause is the Israeli government. But we are beginning to wonder: Has the world agreed with Israel to eliminate us? Is Hamas cooperating with Israel? Where is the Palestinian Authority? Why have Israel and Hamas not yet reached any kind of solution? Are American, Qatari, and Egyptian mediations not enough?

Does the Hamas government or the Palestinian Authority have answers to our daily questions? Do they know how we can meet our basic needs? Our dignity and our lives are being violated daily, and no one is providing us with help — do they know, but just don’t care?

The ICJ decision gave new strength to South Africa’s groundbreaking accomplishment — demolishing the taboo against holding Israel accountable for its crimes. As South Africa’s foreign ministry put it, ​“Today marks a decisive victory for the international rule of law and a significant milestone in the search for justice for the Palestinian people.”

Halt to investigation into 7 October

The Israeli chief of staff, Major General Herzi Halevi, has decided to freeze external committees which he had originally planned to establish in order to investigate the 7 October attack on Israel, until the Israeli army completed its internal investigations, according to Yediot Ahronoth and Ynet News.

The chief of staff reportedly contacted the state comptroller, Matanyahu Engelman, and warned him that his request to investigate the attack could harm the functioning of the army operating in Gaza

“The numbers are heavily relied up for official briefings on civilian casualties because with the exception of strikes on high-value targets, where senior officials are briefed on collateral damage, no civilian casualty figures or estimates are collected,” said the Israeli official, who cannot be identified in the media. “A lot of targets have been hit without prior analysis or estimates and there’s never any follow up collection.”